Instance-based quests in many MMOG's, or instancing, refers to a dynamic where individual players or finite groups of players branch off to play a given quest, possibly at the same time that other players or groups of players do the same thing. In many MMOG's, the player starts in a common area where any other user who is currently logged-in to the same server (or shard) can be seen. From these common areas, the players will venture off to undertake quests or challenges in different parts of the virtual world. Were it not for instancing, the actions of one player on one of these quests would change the game world for all other users. Consider, for example, that a group of players embarks on a quest to slay a powerful dragon nested on top of a mountain some distance from the city center. Should this group be successful in their quest, the dragon would be dead and all of its loot would be divided among the various members of the group. If another user or group decided to embark on the same quest, would they encounter the carcass of the dragon and an empty treasure chamber, or would they also have the opportunity to slay the dragon and gather the loot?

In a game that employs instancing, all players have the opportunity to experience these challenges. The quest designer is in some ways like a designer of a roller-coaster, an architect, an urban planner, an interface designer, and an author. The designer typically has to consider a compelling backstory for all non-player characters and places, the overall length of a quest, the things that a player could or should collect in order to complete the challenge, and in general, must balance open-ended exploration with careful direction of the player toward a climactic resolution.

The instanced quest, therefore, is repeatable and unique (to some extent) each time it is played. Some aspects of the experience, including the stories that people could tell after the experience would be common, but the actual unfolding of events and much of the state of the players' characters and the quest-world itself will vary across instances. In this way, it could be said that instanced quests are shared personal experiences where history and the narrative of experience are not-common, yet similar.

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"This takes the coincident squares idea of 21⁄2D worlds and converts it to that of coincident planes. You step through such a plane, and you’re transported to a self-contained mini-world beyond. The idea is extended, however, by allowing multiple copies of the mini-world to exist. One group of players will go through into their own, private instantiation of the area – an instantiation that will disappear when they leave but which can never be accessed by other players. The next group of players will be taken to their own replica of the area instead. Thus, instances can be regarded as sharded zones of a virtual world.

Instances allow players to access popular content without spoiling the experience for each other, and they mean the content can be fine-tuned for groups of particular sizes. Their disadvantage is that nothing that goes on within an instance can have any effect on the virtual world beyond, in the same way that nothing that goes on in one shard can affect what goes on in another. It can do so at an individual level (allowing you to go somewhere you couldn’t before, for example), but any global effects are likely to be short-lived. Nevertheless, on the whole players approve of the idea of instances and expect them, probably to the point that even if a new virtual world had so much readily-accessible content that it didn’t need to limit access they would still be surprised if it didn’t have instances. "

excerpt from Bartle, R. A. (2007). Making Places.

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The way I like to think of it is, the user maintains state in one way and the system maintains state in another way. We retain memories of our experiences in story form, because the events, changes to the virtual world's state -- the things we saw and did -- happened in time, and the way this unfolded was totally unique for all users. It's the same in a face-to-face conversation. There are ways that we check-in with each other during conversations to ensure that we're on the same page, but our individual recollections of a conversation or events in time -- even for shared moments or events -- are inherently personal.

When shared experience is instanced, choosing the people with whom to 'truly' share experience becomes much more important, right?

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"Virilio: No. The body is extremely important to me, because it is a planet. For instance, if you compare Earth and an astronomer, you will see that the man is a planet. There is a very interesting Jewish proverb that says: "If you save one man, you save the world: That's a reverse version of the idea of the Messiah: one man can save the world, but to save a man is to save the world. The world and man are identical. ...

You are a universe, and so am I; we are four universes here. And there are millions of others around us. Thus the body is not simply the combination of dance, muscles, body-building, strength and sex: it is a universe."

(quoted in Wilson, 2007)

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In instanced-based shared experience, the body (or avatar) bears important markings of a player's experience. The player/character's skill level, inventory, clothing, and wealth all mark the player. At a macro level, a player could appear more/less experienced based on these marking on their character/avatar. At micro level, particular items in a player's possession can indicate the completion of specific quests or challenges. On occasion, these markings on a fellow player may even indicate an unexplored area of the world, or a quest yet to be undertaken. Wearable loot, if you will, can be an extremely important social indicator of personal or shared personal experience.

But even those markings of experience that are not wearable end up tied to the player. Statistics boards, skill points, censures for inappropriate behavior... it is ultimately one subjectivity held accountable for its own actions and experiences.

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You can't step in the same (virtual) river twice, as they say.

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What will History look like when our point of view was silently recorded? What will teaching History entail when one can't be specific about the events because a single "event" happened differently across each of its instances?

What about the new myths that we're creating?

"Odysseus went into a cave where he met a giant Cyclops with a terrible temper..." [what happened next? which time?]

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Perhaps, as Holland Cotter puts it in today's NY Times, "Art is Brief. You have to be there."

References

Bartle, R. A. (2007). Making Places. [Pre-press article distributed by the author.]

Cotter, H. (2007). Art is Brief. You Just Have to Be There. Weekend Arts, New York Times, Friday, November 9, 2007.

Wilson, L. Cyberwar, God, and Television: Interview with Paul Virilio. Available at www.ctheory.net/articles.aspx?id=62.